


just a child (that's all)

by penlex



Series: Traveling [1]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Character Study, Family, Fatherhood, Gen, Kid Fic, Missing Scene, Personal Growth, Rape Recovery, Season/Series 03, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-07
Updated: 2017-12-07
Packaged: 2019-02-11 17:33:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12940260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/penlex/pseuds/penlex
Summary: Mickey is traveling, one step at a time. Mickey is not weak or a coward. He's trying. And he is succeeding.





	just a child (that's all)

**Author's Note:**

> title from Family by Dar Williams
> 
> rated for language and references to past abuse

Mickey stands out on the porch to smoke in the cool tail end of the early spring dusk. The door behind him is open, letting the comparatively fresh air from the city outside waft into the house. From his vantage point, Mickey watches his wife bob around the living room with the baby in her arms, singing softly in Russian. Something not quite a lullaby, too cheerful for that. Svetlana looks happy, a light in her eyes that is never there for anyone but the kid, a soft smile on her face that is there even less often. Yevgeny giggles every time she pauses for breath, every time she swings him in her arm when she makes a turn around the furniture, every time she bounces him a little more.

He's a cute kid. Guiltless and innocent and harmless and helpless like any other infant on the face of the earth.

Mickey has given himself more than one talking to, most of them against his own will. He doesn't want to be a father; never really wanted to be in general, and especially not now, not under these circumstances, not without-

But fuck if he'll let himself be a villain for a child, the way Terry and Frank and countless other assholes in this town are for theirs. Fuck if he will make Yevgeny go through anything like what he or Mandy or-

So Mickey's been trying. He's scolded himself, punished himself, forgiven and rewarded himself, trying to find something that will work. Something that will make him… whatever. Get over it, he guesses. No dice on that, but. He's trying. And he's trying a lot harder than he did for-

Well, he's making progress, is the point. At a semi-reasonable pace, even. Infancy is formative and all that, Mickey's had to hear Kev ranting on about for-fucking-ever now that those two finally got one in the oven, so Mickey can't let Yevgeny wait for three years for him to start getting his shit together like-

Fuck.

Mickey tosses his butt uncaringly over the side of the porch and doesn't let himself hesitate on his own threshold before going back inside. He also doesn't let himself disappear into his- _their_ bedroom immediately like he might have still been doing a few weeks ago. Instead, he leans against the wall and watches Svetlana dance around with Yevgeny, still singing. She doesn't acknowledge him, or at least not that Mickey can notice, but she also doesn't go quiet or make sure her back is to him like she had done when Yevgeny was first born (like she still does with most of Mickey's brothers and with Mandy's fuckhead boyfriend, and like she would do with Terry if Terry hadn't got himself put right back inside barely a week after getting out).

( _Fuck Terry_ , Mickey thinks to himself, like he does now every time Terry comes up. _Fuck Terry for doing what he did to me._ Supposedly it's therapeutic. Supposedly forgiving him would also be therapeutic, but fuck that too. Fuck that especially.)

Mickey is not a coward. Mickey has never been a coward. Mickey can hold a fucking baby and Mickey can fucking be nice to women. Even if he hates them. Even if he doesn't. Even if he's- if he was- if-

 _Fuck_.

Mickey is _not_ a coward. Mickey has never been a coward.

Maybe he still can't think it, nevermind fucking say it out loud, but Mickey knows what fucking happened. And he can fucking handle it. He'll come through it. Even if it's just for spite.

( _Fuck_ Terry.)

Mickey is traveling, taking step after step, and he'll keep going. Because he can (he  _can_ ), and he's not a coward, and because… Well. Because Mickey wants to. Of the paths before him now, past the paths Mickey has had to put behind him, this one is the one Mickey wants to follow. This one is the one Mickey will make for himself.

So, here Mickey is. Only one or two steps away from where he was, but one or two steps further from nowhere.

Svetlana walks over to him where he leans. She's stopped singing now, but Yevgeny hasn't started fussing. It's nearly bedtime for him and he's just blinking slow in her arms. She stops in front of Mickey, watching him closely like he's about to do a magic trick she wants to figure out for herself. She doesn't ask if he wants to hold Yevgeny, but Mickey knows she'd let him if he asked her first. She waits.

Mickey looks at Yevgeny, and Yevgeny looks back at him with Svetlana's eyes underneath Mickey's stupid pointy eyebrows. And Mickey wants to hold him. He really does. Yevgeny looks warm and soft and happy, and Mickey wants to be a part of that. But Yevgeny also looks like _them_ , and-

(Fuck Terry fuck Terry _fuck_ Terry-)

Mickey hasn't traveled quite that far yet.

He cuts Svetlana a guilty glance from the corner of his eye, but she just plants a noisy kiss on the side of Yevgeny's baby-squishy face.

"Is time for bed, _Zhenya_ ," she coos, and carries him into their room to lay him down in his crib. Mickey follows her quietly, to keep watching. Yevgeny goes down easily, making quiet sleepy baby noises that tug at Mickey's chest. When Svetlana is satisfied, she falls face first into their bed with a gusty sigh, and Mickey can't help the upward tilt of his lips at the dramatics - a little unusual for her, but there's no one else here to see but him. Mickey guesses that must mean they're building trust or whatever. Probably a good thing for parents to have, especially if they ain't got the other thing.

Mickey climbs into bed next to her, even though it's early as fuck. He stares up at the ceiling and pretends not to notice that she's treating him now to the same watchful eye that he'd given her while she'd danced around with the- with…

Mickey hasn't traveled far enough yet to touch. But he's not standing still. He takes a deep breath, and one more tiny step.

"Our kid have a middle name?" he asks Svetlana, without looking at her. She hums in response.

"I named him after you," she says. Mickey's head jerks, but he doesn't look. His heart races.

'Our baby,' he'd said. Their baby.

His baby.

"Well," Svetlana continues, either ignorant of Mickey's issues or uncaring. Or maybe just letting him keep them to himself. "Not exactly after you. Russian version of your name."

"Oh, yeah?" Mickey says, and they both pretend his voice comes out less weak than it does. Mickey is not weak. "What's the Russian version?"

"Mikhail," Svetlana answers. "Good, strong name."

"Sounds like a girl's name," Mickey argues with a snort. It's familiar and it's comfortable, and it's also definitely true. Svetlana snorts back at him.

"No," she says simply. "Strong. Boy with strong name will grow up into strong man." She says it softly, in a tone Mickey has only heard her use for the- for _their_ baby. Maybe this time that tone is for Yevgeny too. Maybe it's not. Mickey kind of thinks it's not. He closes his eyes, breathes deep, and believes her.

Mickey is not weak. He is not a coward. He's strong. He's trying. And he is succeeding.

Mickey will be a good father to Yevgeny. Yevgeny Mikhail, who is named after him, who was born the way he was with no say in it, who is just like any other baby, who needs Mickey to take care of him. To love him.

Mickey will be a good father to his son.


End file.
